[Peetwo]

Glen B embuggerance - UPDATE.




The UP thread is still running hot and given the importance of this current CASA embuggerance in the broader context, I have decided to regurgitate some of the more pertinent posts starting from the Glen B handwritten letter to St Commode:

https://auntypru.com/wp-content/uploads/...letter.pdf

Sandy Reith:

Glen’s hand written letter

Anyone reading Glen’s letter couldn’t fail to appreciate the depth of feeling and the sense of longing for a resolution from CASA. Having witnessed many careless and punitive actions of CASA throughout GA across the last fifty years I would fully concur with the other experienced voices here. From my very limited knowledge of the subject, I understand that Glen has embarked on a business model that enables flying schools to combine some functions in order to meet new and extraordinarily expensive CASA administrative requirements. My guess is that CASA never considered such a rational move and hence Glen’s model, in the eyes of CASA, is unconventional. Nothing upsets the bureaucratic juggernaut more than being outwitted, it confronts the beast and calls into question its hegemony. It lives on primacy and authority and will have no qualms whatever to remove anything it perceives to threaten it’s position. It can’t do too much to the airlines, they are too big and will have huge clout politically, so GA is the fall guy, a plaything, whipping boy and reason for the ever changing rules and restrictions.

Only political moves can change the behaviour of CASA.

I well remember Brian Reddish coming to me, about thirty years ago, looking for support because, at the end game, they crushed his Hervey Bay fixed and rotary wing flying schools and charter ops by sitting on his applications for new CFI and or CP appointments. Then he couldn’t operate, ran out of money and just folded. By not formerly cancelling or suspending his operating permissions he had no direct means to counter their unjustified actions against him.

And from the "K" post above:

glenb – “I was fully approved, and then in October 2018, I received a notice that CASA intended to bring a cessation to all operations, and that's where the story begins. There was no prior indication at all. That opened up a pandoras box of problems. Soon I will start outlining some of these on here.

I must emphasise that there are no allegations of any safety concerns, in fact CASA have agreed that APTA increases safety, so one would wonder my Mr Graeme Crawford in his role would work so diligently to bring APTA down. This individual may be a ripper bloke outside of the work environment, and probably gets himself involved in the local community, and contributes widely. I can only talk of my own personal experience with him, but in my opinion his manner is bullying and intimidating in nature and only degrades safety outcomes.

Whilst, it is only my perspective, and he is entitled to Procedural Fairness, I have launched a substantive complaint against him I feel that he has compromised safety, acted in breach of his obligations under the PGPA Act, and breached CASAs own Regulatory philosophy.

I have no doubt that at some stage this morning, I will receive a letter from CASA threatening action against me, but frankly, its time for me to protect APTAs reputation, and the many professionals that have workred in so diligently and in such a well intentioned manner. Let me return shortly with only one example of my CASA experience. Everything is fact, and I will provide evidence. As it is related to aviation safety, it is in the public interest.

Once again folks, thank you for the support.

Hmm...shades of the Scottish Git's letter to Bruce Rhoades...



Next St Commode in reply:

Initial Response - Shane Carmody

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'Dear Mr Buckley,

Thank you for your letter of 28 May 2019.

In the first instance it is important that I publicly confirm for you (and for those addressees you have chosen to include) that:

There is no administrative action currently pending against APTA, and

That no adverse decisions have been taken by CASA in relation to APTA's authorisations to conduct flight training.

I will review the various matters you have raised and will respond in due course.

Regards

Shane

Shane Carmody
CEO and Director of Aviation Safety
Civil Aviation Safety Authority'

And then: Initial Notication to APTA from CASA (click on link to read)

Next glenb continues:

CASA initial action

Dear CASA,

Please find above, the initial correspondence that you sent to me. At 9AM on the morning of 23 rd October 2018, I had no inkling at all that I was to receive that notification. CASA had not previously raised any concerns at all with me, in fact they had been extremely encouraging and supporting of the concept. My reasonable expectation is that the CASA Subject Matter Expert (SME) from my Certificate Management Team, would have raised any concerns with me prior to initiating such a substantive process. As you can see from the correspondence, there are no allegations of safety concerns raised, but rather an accusation related to the Aviation Ruling and our Temporary locations procedure, which I will attend to later.

This document, was effectively a "request for documents" and no determination had been made, and I was not given the opportunity to respond or defend myself.

CASA provided a surety of operations for only 7 days into the future, as you can see from the document. From the period 30th October until 25th January 2019, my business operated literally on a minute by minute approval, On 25th January 2019 you notified me that my business could continue operating for three months until 25th April 2019. On 12th February 2019 you advised me that my business could continue operating until 13th May 2019. On 3rd May 2019 you advised that my business could continue operating until 1st July 2019.

Consider the commercial impact on any business, when you take such action. APTAs "product" was in fact surety of operations into the future, in the more expensive to operate regulatory environment.

Imagine if CASA walked into QANTAS, made allegations, did not give QANTAS the right to respond. Placed a temporary date on their business, prevented them taking on any new customers, and prohibited them from marketing their ability. Quite simply, no business in Australia can have action taken against them by a Government Department of such a nature and be expected to "weather the storm". As Mr Carmody stated he does not believe any administrative action has been taken. This has been CASAs stance, and it is this stance that has prevented me going to the AAT to appeal CASAs decision. Therefore Mr Carmody, if what you say is correct, then it only reaffirms my position that CASA have denied me procedural fairness.

This is in my opinion a variation to my AOC. If as CASA claim, it is not, then I would ask them to provide an example of a variation to an AOC.

How can CASA take such substantive action against a business on a simple "request for documents and not based on safety concerns.

Consider the impact of your action on my business, and the people who depend on me for their livelihood;

No one will approach APTA to join as a Member, because APTA has only a limited period of operation.
I cannot attract new staff to the Organisation, because I don't know if we will be approved.
APTA has been prevented from marketing or adding on any new customers.
Every one of my exceptional staff and the member entities now have only that assured employment.
I cannot enter into contracts of supply due the potential limited date of operations.
The business previously valued at a fair amount has now become worthless.

I have no issue with any CASA action provided the approach complies with CASAs own regulatory philosophy, it is well intentioned, and the decision is made in the interest of aviation safety In this case I am firmly of the opinion that it is not. By CASA choosing to adopt this stance they have in my opinion breached their obligations under Administrative Law, Procedural Fairness, and the concept of natural justice.

With reference to CASAs Regulatory Philosophy. You may recall that this was borne from a the ASSR Review (Forsythe Review). It was a direct result of the manner in which CASA had been engaging with Industry.

I attach the link below, and would particularly like to address the manner CASA engaged me against

Item 1
Item 2
Item 3
Item 5
Item 6
Item 7
Item 8
Item 9
Item 10

Item https://www.casa.gov.au/about-us/sta...ory-philosophy

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&..

The Temporay base location

Following on from my previous thread, and the document I have posted above, you will see how CASA initially pursued a path of using the Aviation Ruling and our Temporary base procedure. As that line of attack failed, they moved to audit results from Latrobe Valley that were proven to be in error. The argument them moved to content of the contracts, then moved to a requirement for signed contracts, and that has now moved on to the content of the contract again, which I am still awaiting CASA direction on.

For this post let me deal with the Temporary locations. The background to this is that for as long as I recall Flying Schools have been able to use a "temporary locations" procedure. This facilitated flying schools running operations from a different location than their main base, for short term use.

During the APTA design stage I worked with a CASA team referred to as CMT 2. These personnel were well intentioned, and had a good grasp of APTA and CASA material. The conversation at the time went very similar to;

APTA "Once we put in an application for a new base to join us, how long do you anticipate it would take CASA to process the application so that we can activate the base"

CASA "Approximately 6 to 8 weeks, but in the interim you could activate them through a " Temporary locations procedure, while CASA makes their assessment. That will facilitate continuing operations.

APTA; That's great, lets go down that path.

So in the design stage we adopted the recommended CASA procedure initially which is extracted from CASAs own guidance material and please make note of that fact, as it will become more pertinent later in this post. We placed that into our manuals and adopted that procedure. Under CASAs very own procedure, that we adopted in our manuals they approved bases under that procedure, so I reasonably felt that CASAs own procedure was acceptable. In November 2017, we underwent a Level 1 CASA audit, being the highest level audit, and that audit included the bases and no concerns were raised at all by CASA at that time.

Then as you are aware and without any prior concern expressed, CASA hit me with that notification suggesting I was in breach by using that procedure, which lead to a meeting in the CASA Office. This time under a different CMT as CASA had initiated a change of CMT oversighting APTA.

The new Regional Manager made a statement, that he had legal advice that the Temporary locations procedure was not intended for flying schools. That surprised me. We then advised that is the guidance we had received from CASA CMT 2. The FOI demanded "Did you get that in writing'. At this stage it became apparent that the CASA personnel I was dealing with were not familiar with their own guidance material.

I have made multiple requests to CASA over the last 7 months to explain what is the breach, that attracts the restricted date of operations.

How can I possibly have a breach, if CASA offered the procedure, CASA approved it, then approved bases under the procedure, and then audited us on it, and then does not explain the issue to me. I cannot fix something up unless I know what is wrong. The procedure has been around for years

This entire matter appears to me to be somewhat confusing. A couple of interesting side issues. Our first base under the procedure was quoted as a 5 hour task, which we paid CASA the fee for, and in fact it took them almost a year to process. Thankyou CMT for suggesting a well intentioned, compliant, tested procedure, so that particular base didn't have to wait 10 months to be activated.

I have cut and pasted the CASA suggested procedure below, and attached our procedure as it is somewhat larger than, and perhaps more robust than CASAs suggestion.

"Where flying training activities are required to be conducted at an alternate location from the company's main training base, the following matters must be considered:
1. Exposition change management procedures
2. Instructor familiarity with the
a) aerodrome;
b) local operating procedures; and
c) risks associated with operating at that aerodrome.
3. Aerodrome suitability for the task, including:
a) other users of the aerodrome
b) physical dimensions and characteristics, in respect to the types of aircraft proposed to be operated
c) preference for the use of registered or certified aerodromes;
and) if an ALA is to be used, the advice in paragraphs 4B6.7 and 4B6.8 must be considered, in addition to the other considerations listed in this section.
4. The availability of suitable facilities and services such as:
a) flight planning, briefing and crew rest and refreshment areas
b) fuel
c) aircraft parking areas
d) aircraft maintenance services.
e) NOTAM and weather services
f) communication ability with operational headquarters and other relevant agencies such as:- Fire services- Ambulance- Police- Aerodrome owner- Airservices Australia. "

I am confident that the Temporary Loactions procedure in the attachment is equal to the best practice in the industry

Then from Leadie:

Originally Posted by Sandy Reith 

Only political moves can change the behaviour of CASA.
I well remember Brian Reddish coming to me, about thirty years ago, looking for support because, at the end game, they crushed his Hervey Bay fixed and rotary wing flying schools and charter ops by sitting on his applications for new CFI and or CP appointments. Then he couldn’t operate, ran out of money and just folded. By not formerly cancelling or suspending his operating permissions he had no direct means to counter their unjustified actions against him.

Folks,

And, as I remember all too well, trying to help Brian. The CASA complaints were completely without merit- and subsequently disproved, but by then, an honourable man and his family, as well as his business, had been destroyed.
Where have we heard this story before --- time and again!!

Tootle pip!!

And on 'clear and concise':

Sandy:

The CASA philosophy

Reading from the CASA website about it’s philosophy we find the following, quote:-

clear and concise, using plain language and concepts wherever possible

One could be forgiven for thinking that this says it all. The Act says “clear and concise.” It does not have a free get out of jail card such as “wherever possible.”

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glenb - Clear and concise

Interesting point Sandy, the obligation to provide "clear and concise aviation safety standards' is actually an obligation that CASA are required to achieve, and in fact I provide the extract from the Civil Aviation Act below.

The failure to achieve that, impacts significantly across industry, and in fact I suggest every business owner in the GA sector has been impacted by this failure. In fact that leads beautifully into my next post, which further and highlights the failure. Now that failure alone wouldn't be as significant, if it was accompanied by a collaborative approach from CASA towards industry. Its not an environment to act in a bullying or intimidating nature. In fact everything in this story comes back to those failures. The failure to achieve clear and concise aviation safety standards and the failure to act in a well intentioned manner.

9 CASA’s functions (1) CASA has the function of conducting the safety regulation of the following, in accordance with this Act and the regulations:
(a) civil air operations in Australian territory;
(b) the operation of Australian aircraft outside Australian territory;
(ba) ANZA activities in New Zealand authorised by Australian AOCs with ANZA privileges;
by means that include the following: © developing and promulgating appropriate, clear and concise aviation safety standards;

The latest from glenb 3/06/19:

CASAS APPROACH IMPACTS ON SAFETY

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To those of us operating at the General Aviation (GA level) in Australia, and I include smaller Charter Operators and Flying Schools in that grouping, the manner in which CASA conducts itself with Industry compromises safety and that's why it must be checked.

Whilst I am somewhat time limited, I do intend to demonstrate, from my own personal experience, how the Aviation Group headed up by Mr Graeme Crawford has lead actions, or been responsible for actions that have negatively impacted on safety in my Organisation On all occasions my organisation has taken action, and often at significant expense,to counter the effects of those actions.

I intend in this post, and by updating via the "edit" function, to very clearly demonstrate that. I am sitting here waiting to have a coffee with someone, so will return and update as time permits. 

Example One

I have received a very high level of support from many areas of industry including many GA Operators. My advice is do not become involved in my issue if you have a commercial interest in the industry. If you have nothing to lose, or are prepared to lose everything, I welcome your support. 

I have been a critic of many of CASAS decisions over the years, and I have put my name to those criticisms. I've been very upfront admittedly. The passage of time has demonstrably proven my criticisms correct. From my own personal experience, CASA as an organisation, is dangerously resistant to Continuous Improvement or substantive feedback. From my personal experience, that creates personnel within CASA that have an "axe to grind", and they will use their position inappropriately, and make decisions that cannot be demonstrated to be in the interests of safety. The result of those decisions, is that they will cause commercial, or other damage to your business. CASA personnel would be aware of those impacts when they make those decisions. I draw on my own personal experience when I make those statements. That commercial impact on your business and its effects on safety must be considered, in deciding your course of action.

CASA have created an environment where many operators feel too are scared to intimidated to speak up. That negatively impacts on safety. That has been my personal experience.

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And in support of glenb:

Okihara - Glen, thanks for sharing your story and spearheading the effort against this tyranny.

Words of encouragement will only lift your spirits so much and, as you mentioned, some who may not want to become personally involved with your issue may still want to put their money where their mouth is (or would be in this case).

Quote:

CASA have created an environment where many operators feel too are scared to intimidated to speak up. That negatively impacts on safety. That has been my personal experience.

Hence: why not set up a gofundme.com page and raise some funds for your upcoming legal expenses? As others pointed out, you need to lawyer up lest you get gobbled up by your opponent. Many in the industry stand to benefit from your initiative so let them support you. This way people can support you while remaining anonymous.

What I would also suggest: Think of this as opportunity to take the APTA philosophy of united we stand to make it the defender of GA rights across the board and not just for your own organisation. Talk to your contacts in flight schools across the country and propose a $10/h (voluntary) increase on instruction rates to finance your legal costs.

Apologies if that has already been mentioned before. I'm still catching up with this thread.

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Stickshift3000 - I'm a student at an APTA-affiliated flying school. Having witnessed the significant benefits of this business arrangement first hand, I - and likely many other students - would be happy to offer any support via means mentioned above.

MTF...P2